


Fear

by Haberdasher



Category: Original Work
Genre: Depression, Gen, References to Depression, Self-Harm, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-25
Updated: 2017-01-25
Packaged: 2019-09-23 14:36:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17082164
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Haberdasher/pseuds/Haberdasher
Summary: A story based on the writing prompt "Upon reaching maturity, young adults gain the ability to control what they fear most."





	Fear

Sonya always played coy when asked what her power was.

The question came about fairly often, as many people used it as their go-to conversation starter- powers were something that everybody over eighteen had, many were surprising or had interesting stories behind their emergence, and it was a good way to get somebody talking about their past. A few men even tried to use it as a pick-up line, saying that they couldn’t imagine a woman like her being afraid of anything, or that somebody so fascinating must have an equally fascinating power.

Sonya’s usual response was to make the questioner guess what her power was, and after a couple of wrong guesses she would laugh it off and change the subject. Once or twice, when somebody simply wouldn’t take the hint, she had claimed that she didn’t have a power, that she was living proof that people who feared nothing would lose out in the end, but that story was a last resort. Sonya didn’t like lying, didn’t like forcing herself to tell a story that simply wasn’t true, but sometimes it was just easier than the truth.

They didn’t really want to hear the truth, anyway. They wanted to hear some cute little tale about how she used to hate spiders or fire or the dark, but after turning eighteen she learned to embrace her power, to turn fear into strength, and so on. A sweet little anecdote, that’s all they wanted.

They didn’t want to hear about how dark her teenage years really were.

They didn’t want to hear that when she was fifteen, Sonya cried herself to sleep for weeks on end without really knowing why.

They didn’t want to hear that when she was sixteen, every time she stood by an open window or at the edge of a bridge, Sonya felt the urge to jump, to let her body fall through the air and smash into the ground far below.

They didn’t want to hear that when she was seventeen, Sonya gave herself several deep scars, now long since faded, covered up with carefully-chosen clothing or meticulously-applied concealer. 

They didn’t want to hear that when she was seventeen, Sonya took a handful of pills from the medicine cabinet and spent the rest of the week in the hospital instead of at school.

They didn’t want to hear that when she was seventeen, Sonya was shuffled around to a dozen different doctors and put on twice as many medications, and none of them did a damn thing, except for the ones that made her worse- and she had been surprised at the time to find that there still was a worse.

They didn’t want to hear that when she was seventeen, Sonya wasn’t sure which possibility seemed more daunting- that she wouldn’t make it to eighteen, or that she would.

They didn’t want to hear about how when she woke up the morning of her eighteenth birthday, Sonya felt awake and alert, ready to take on the world, no longer despairing about her place in the universe- and it had taken her a while to put together the pieces, to connect this sudden burst of energy to the power that she knew was supposed to come that day.

How was she supposed to explain all of that to a stranger who was just trying to make conversation?

How was she supposed to tell someone that when she was a teenager, what she had feared most was her own mind?


End file.
